A Little Bit More
As the unit poster indicates, there are about 50 different species of mice in North America and that doesn’t count all of the voles, lemmings, and rats too. One doesn’t have to be a mathematician to realize that the rodents are a very common group of mammals.
Although it may seem that the “experts” certainly must know one kind of mouse from another, this is just not the case. Granted, if you know what part of the country and what habitat a given rodent comes from, one can certainly limit the possibilities, but our rodents are still a confusing bunch of mammals.
Scientists eager to determine what species is living in a plot of land, say in central Missouri, for example, could go to an area and trap rodents to find out. Unfortunately, catching rodents is not always easy and how does one know that they aren’t catching one or two easy-to-catch species while a third isn’t being captured at all? Researchers have come up with an excellent way to accomplish their job – let someone else do the work! Mammal researchers quickly learned that they could go to an area and instead of looking for mammals, look for owls. The owls were constantly scanning the area for food each night and during the day, were roosting in thick groves of trees. Beneath the trees where they roost are the owl pellets consisting of the undigested parts of their prey – mostly hair and bone. By picking up the owl pellets and examining the teeth in the skulls inside, researchers can determine with a high degree of accuracy what small mammals are living in a given area.
Activities
Science – Toothy Smile
Objectives: Learn a bit about our teeth
Materials: Access to internet
Here are a few good sites that discuss human teeth for you to check out.
Good information on human teeth
More info on human teeth
Nice images of vole teeth (molars)
Key Concepts
Adaptations and Diversity, Identification, Structures and Functions
Questions
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